I have an '03 Corolla with 57K miles. I probably way overdo the service on things like AT transmission service, cooling system, etc. But i live in the desert. The manufacturer manual recommends 30 K / 2 yr interval on cooling system service and 60 K / 4 yr interval on AT service for rough usage. I can find nothing in the manual on PS flush, brake flush and intake/FI service. Does anyone have any recommendations? Does anyone disagree with the recommended intervals on AT and cooling service?
I don't recall Toyota recommending any maintenance on PS fluid, Brake fluid or intake cleaning but I would plan on doing these soon. I'd do a PS flush and a Brake fluid flush to start and either have a professional intake cleaning done or you can do a seafoam yourself. You can also manually clean the throttle body and MAF with special cleaner sprays.
Then once a year from now on just suck out/refill the PS and Brake fluid reservoirs (if you do this regularly a flush shouldn't be necessary) and clean the throttle body and MAF sensor. It shouldn't take more than 20-30 minutes to do all of this. Finish it off with a bottle of Fuel Injector cleaner in the tank (I don't have much faith in that stuff to repair FI problems but it definitely works as a 'once in a while' maintenance).
I'd be tempted to do an ATF drain/fill every 15k or so due to the desert environment as well. I don't see any reason to do more frequent cooling system service especially if you're using the correct Toyota coolant.
The Following User Says Thank You to MasterTecInSTL For This Useful Post:
Thanks for the reply. Because I live in the desert I have been getting PS and brakes flushed every couple of years. Same with tranny and cooling system. I had the throttle body done once but kind of think it is pretty much a waste. I hadn't seen anything in the manual re: recommended intervals on PS and brake flush. But the dealer keeps pushing those services. My daughter uses this care around town. But next summer she is off to graduate school some place back east. Definitely before then I'll have all the services done.
Dealers are just as bad (if not worse) than independent shops when it comes to over-selling maintenance.
Save yourself some big bucks and learn to do some of this yourself. You can save literally hundreds of dollars and it's so easy to do.
You don't need to flush the P/S and Brake fluids.. just once or twice a year suck the fluid out of the reservoirs and put fresh in. The throttle body cleaning is easy and while I disagree with you about it being a waste I also don't feel it is something that has to be done multiple times a year.
Thanks for that. Yeah, my local Toyota dealer has been harping on changing my '10 Yaris brake fluid ever since I hit 25K miles. His rationale is we live in the desert. The car is 18 months old and has 31K miles (it is my commute car ... I get 38 mpg - half I10 and half city streets, and I do not baby it. But it is a stick with no options. My weekend vehicle is a '09 Tacoma crew cab with the large 6 ... very luxurious and 21.5 mpg combined). The Yaris hardly needs brake fluid.
Is it safe to assume a turkey baster will work to suction fluid?
Speaking of tranny service. My Tacoma had a rear seal leak (apparently there was a TSB for '09) that ended up with a drive shaft replacement (I am guessing the dealer was trying to pad the bill to Toyota, Inc). I was floored when I found I had a sealed tranny and then the dealer described the hassle (my words) of properly filling it. Wow! Would you still recommend 15K service? As I recall R&R the fluid was more costly than doing a more conventional design.
Would you mind explaining why I'd want to clean the TB and MAF sensor? And is that the same thing I've heard described as a "motor vac"? Lastly, where can I learn how to do it?
Long ago I proudly did all my own automotive work. I had all the tools and took great pride and had a lot of fun not only maintaining my cars but rebuilding engines, helping friends do it, and so on. The one thing I've never gotten into was a tranny, other than to replace a torque converter. And body work was no fun ... too much sanding and the like. Eventually, by about 20 years ago automobile electronics overwhelmed me and I lost interest. Maybe it is time to resurrect at least some of the aspects of do-it-yourself auto maintenance. I did channel a lot of my mechanical aptitude into reloading and the like. But you've piqued my curiosity.
If you consider yourself to live in very extreme conditions then 15k trans fluid changes might be acceptable.. and by this I mean a drain/fill and not a complete flush. Honestly I think 30k would be just fine even for that.
Over time carbon builds up on the throttle body. This carbon can do two things. It can make the throttle valve stick causing it to not close all the way and make the gas pedal stick when you first press on it. Also it can disturb the air flow going into the engine and affect efficiency. Excess carbon can also work its way up into the idle control motor and cause issues there.
The Mass Air flow sensor works by heating up a filament. As air passes across the filament it cools off and causes the resistance to change. The computer measures this change in resistance and calculates air flow based on that. If the filament gets dirty enough it gets insulated from the airflow and as a result the computer gets a false reading which screws up its air/fuel calculations. Lack of power, low fuel economy and false "engine running lean" codes can eventually develop.
Keep in mind cleaning these isn't something that has to be done all the time... maybe every couple of years or 30,000 miles or so is definitely worth the hassle. I tend to 'overclean' mine probably every time I need a new air filter but to me it's so easy and inexpensive to do.. it's more of a "why not?" kind of thing.
"MotorVac" is a company that makes a lot of maintenance equipment but they started out with a device that installs onto the fuel rail and pumps a solvent in that dissolves carbon build up on fuel injectors, valves, and inside of the intake. This was important to fix issues back when fuel injected systems were first getting popular in the 80's and 90's but gasoline formulations have become so advanced these days that it's pretty much a non-issue - especially where 10% ethanol is added. Besides there are additives you can put in your fuel tank once a year or so that costs literally a few bucks and works great as maintenance to help prevent this sort of thing from occurring. There are also products like "seafoam" which work almost as well that requires no special equipment. Also the "water ingestion" cleaning method also works well as long as you're extremely careful not to hydro-lock your engine in the process.
As far as learning how to do this maintenance yourself you can invest in repair manuals or even ask questions in places like.. well here!
Last edited by MasterTecInSTL; 11-28-2011 at 10:55 PM.
The Following User Says Thank You to MasterTecInSTL For This Useful Post:
Are the mechanics/techs employed by dealers any more qualified than those employed by independent shops, assuming ASE certification? I am not talking about JiffyLube or Walmart, or even BrakeMax (except for brakes and suspension stuff). The one advantage I can see for a dealer tech is she/he works on one company's cars for the most part, whereas an independent shop works on a variety. I assume that practice makes perfect, in auto maintenance/repair as well as golf or target practice.
Dealers usually employ a few lube techs (no certification required), a few helpers (no certification required), a few journeymen and/or apprentices (some certification and ongoing training), and usually at least one fully certified (and trained) tech. It all depends on the size of the dealer. A certified tech usually has to be on staff in order to do warranty work - not necessarily doing the work himself but at least supervising the work being done.
The dealers don't usually care about ASE certifications as they use their own certification methods but it's important to understand that just because someone is certified and trained doesn't mean they are worth a crap.
I remember back in 2004 we had a big dealership strike here. I was hired on as a scab at a Ford dealer with no Ford training (I actually have very little "formal" training on anything but I'm very fast at learning things on my own). Anyway once we got caught up they started handing me the cars that their own Ford Certified guys (the ones who were on strike) couldn't figure out. Some had been messing with these cars for months before the strike even began!
Needless to say they pretty much wrote me a blank check to get these cars fixed and out of 17 cars that had completely stumped even their most experienced guys I was able to fix 16 of them. The 17th I wasn't allowed to touch due to a Ford engineering team investigation.
I even spent a good 45 minutes on the phone with one engineer over a squeaking noise in the rear. I was actually able to locate and fix the noise as it was something crazy no one would ever expect. Needless to say he was very curious as to how I fixed it and authorized for me to get paid for six hours of labor time on the warranty repair (even though the repair itself took me less than ten minutes and less than an hour of noise diagnostics to figure out). About a week later a TSB was issued on how to fix that problem.
It was really cool and I made a HECK of a lot of money during those few months. They actually rehired me shortly after the strike was over but business got slow and because of Union rules they ended up having to lay me off first because I was lowest in seniority. It was ok though because their other moron die-hard union guys were just looking for a reason to set me up (and many tried!)
You're right about dealer guys seeing more of the "common problems" because they work on the same cars all of the time. They are also privy to manufacturer information that doesn't get released to the general public. Ford called these "Special Service Messages" and I'm sure Toyota has something similar. Kind of the same thing as a publicly issued Technical Service Bulletin except the information never leaves the dealer's hands. This can be a problem too though as dealer techs tend to get lazy and rely too heavily on these Service Bulletins so when they run into a problem they actually have to figure out themselves they don't know what to do.
Last edited by MasterTecInSTL; 11-29-2011 at 11:18 PM.
Mastertech in stlouis, If I can add my 2 cents I agree with most of your comments. Just wanna add people ought to get more mechanically informed even if they don't do the work. The repair bill is always smaller when you know what a crankshaft sensor does than if you got that dear in the headlight look. I do most my own maintenance thanks to this forum I have saved a small fortune. Just changed my serpentine belt too me 15 minutes. Total cost 28.00 for belt. Stealer wanted 149.00 dollars. Bought a set of rhino ramps and change the oil and tranny fluid myself. I am from the old school if it ain't broke it ain't getting fixed. Thats why I don't fool with the fuel system. 82K miles and not one fuel hick up. I am not going to start monkeying with it now. The stuff I can't do the mechanics know I know how an automobile runs so my repair bill is low and they know there is no chance of upselling me on service.
The Following User Says Thank You to extreme one For This Useful Post:
You are absolutely correct about being mechanically informed extreme one. Throughout my career I've found that customers that are better educated about their vehicles are so much better to deal with than misinformed ones.
I like to take the time to try to educate my customers but that's difficult to do if they simply don't know anything (or don't care). The ones that are clueless are the same one that always think I'm trying to rip them off because they think I'm just making up a bunch of mumbo-jumbo to justify taking advantage of them.
Simply put the customers that take the time to educate themselves about it tend to get better pricing and much better service than those who don't. Why? Because I HATE being accused of being a cheat. The educated customer will understand why it costs what it does and why it takes as long as it takes where as the uneducated customer just gets pissy when I can't have their seven hour repair job done before lunch! Even if the job only takes me five hours guess who is going to get a discounted price as a result? That's right! Not the pissy one!
I have worked at places that operate by taking advantage of uneducated customers and.. well there's a reason I don't work in those places any more. It's shops like that that give the industry a really bad reputation but unfortunately as business continues to slow and as the economy continues to decline more and more shops are "digging deep" and trying to oversell more and more in order to keep pulling a profit. What they don't realize is that they are shooting themselves in the foot by doing so.
Extreme one I do however disagree with the old school mentality of "if it ain't broke don't fix it". Just the fact that you change your oil shows that you don't fully follow that philosophy.. after all the old oil is still working just fine.. why change it, right?
There's a fine line between keeping the car reliable and keep maintenance costs down. Theoretically you can have a shop flush out all of your fluids, change all of your belts, hoses and tires and rebuild your engine and transmission twice a year but those maintenance costs would be astronomical!
Then again you could learn to do all that yourself twice a year and save a lot of money (compared to having a shop do it) but it still wouldn't be cheap and it'd be extremely time consuming!
Then again all of that isn't even needed nearly as frequently so why even bother in the first place?
When it comes down to maintenance that is extremely inexpensive, not at all time consuming, and does no harm to perform then why wouldn't you want to do it on a regular basis?
You don't want to monkey with the fuel system.. well why not? You're not going to hurt anything? I've seen cars with throttle bodies that were so gummed up the gas pedal was extremely difficult to press in the morning. The moisture trapped in the carbon (like a sponge) would freeze up in the winter mornings and make it so you couldn't press down on the gas pedal at all.
Do you know these newer "drive by wire" cars have logic programmed in to disable the throttle if it detects this? About 95% of cars that got towed in to me for having no throttle response were fixed with a few shots of cleaner solvent from a $5 can of cleaner.
I don't know paying $70 for a tow, $40 for a diagnostic and $100 for a fuel system cleaning (for a total of about $210) PLUS the inconvenience of being without the car for the morning (and maybe even paying for a rental) to fix this one little problem.. now that seems foolish to me! But according to your logic it would be OK because before that happened it wasn't "broken".
Last edited by MasterTecInSTL; 11-30-2011 at 01:46 PM.
I can't argue with you stlouis tech. All good points again. I am baseing my experences of over 40 years of owners with various car models. What has worked for me and has saved me tons was using common sense. I change oil at 5K not 3K as the industries want. Transfluid is good for 75 K. Coolant 60K tire rotation for the front wheel cars are at 25K. Car gets a full detail by me of course every summer. I check those belts and hoses twice a year. I noticed cracks in that belt so I changed it a 80K. If I had not seen the cracks and the belt was still good I would not of changed it. I keep an eye on my vehicle and don't fall for the '"600 dollar" preventive maint specials. Btw I change my own wiper blades too.
Now you're scaring me. Is ASE certification for independents only? And wouldn't a major dealer like a Toyota dealer find it in their best financial interest to have well qualified techs? Or do they figure they can out last all but the most determined complainer? After all, a blown up engine probably isn't worth suing over, after lawyer's fees.
I agree that certification doesn't guarantee competency - in anything - but it is an indicator of at least some minimal qualification. I am an engineer (very senior technical guy) in a large aerospace company. And we have our share of certified incompetents. When I look at a resume I take experience only as an indicator. The question is, what can the person actually do, and can he/she do it in our environment? Won't know until we try them out. And sometime the guy who looks best on paper is a dud. In fact when it comes to hiring newbies I prefer engineers from second tier schools over elite schools. We're not an R&D shop and often the second tier guys make up for what they may lack in some advanced knowledge with plain hard work. Certification is merely means one has passed an exam or two after some level of training, whether it is a doctor, a pilot or an auto tech.
At Ford I was actually penalized at times for getting my diagnostics correct the first time. Why? Because the other guys played the "lets throw this part on and guess at the problem" game and as a result they "sold" more parts than I did and their average ticket $$ was higher.
Don't get me wrong there are some really good dealer techs out there - but there are some really bad ones too.. but this is true in all shops not just dealerships.
There is a shortage of qualified techs and as a result dealers often have to choose between "gambling" with hiring an experienced ASE certified tech -or- hiring a young "kid" straight out of technical school that is already half way to earning the manufacturer's certifications. They usually choose the latter. Why? Less training. Plus they get to groom them in their procedures and don't have to worry about that tech questioning what's right vs. what is wrong all the time.
I worked with one guy working as an apprentice at Ford. He was only a couple months away from graduating tech school and had already passed all the ASE tests (lacking only the hands-on training to be granted ASE certification). He had already earned a few Ford certifications.
Anyway they put him in charge of figuring out why the brake/turn signals weren't working correctly on a BRAND NEW Expedition. They would start to light up but then flicker and flash real fast and the more of a load the circuit had to handle the goofier things got. I watched spend all day.. about six hours total.. replacing bulbs and measuring voltages and tracing wires and swapping relays. I was pretty busy myself and didn't have time to babysit him.
Anyway towards the end of the day I asked him what he had been struggling with all day so he showed me what was going on. I immediately recognized it as a ground issue but he assured me that he had already checked the grounds and the wires and he could not find a problem. I told him "It's BRAND NEW. You're not going to find a corroded connection or a dry-rotted wire insulation." I explained to him that he needs to be looking at this from a "manufacturing defect" point of view.. basically something isn't built properly. I specifically mentioned wire terminals that may not be fully seated in a connector.
Anyway I went back to work and FIVE MINUTES LATER he found where the wire had backed out of the connector and snapped it in place and everything was working fine. It just goes to show that all the education in the world and all of the training and certification can't match what plain common sense and experience has to offer.
desertratr, it's not that ASE certifications are for independents only, it's that the manufacturers usually have their own method of training and certifying technicians and in their minds that trumps ASE certifications.
thatoneguy I never said the road to dealership grade technician training is easy, but like all professions there are those that are good at it and those that are not and all of the training in the world can't change the fact that someone is an idiot. I have to say that of all the techs I've worked with in my life, REGARDLESS OF CERTIFICATION maybe about 30% are actually worth a damn.
The AutoGuide.com network consists of the largest network of enthusiast-owned enthusiast-operated automotive communities.
AutoGuide.com provides the latest car reviews, auto show coverage, new car prices, and automotive news. The AutoGuide network operates more than 100 automotive forums where our users consult peers for shopping information and advice, and share opinions as a community.
ToyotaNation.com is an independent Toyota/Lexus enthusiast website. ToyotaNation.com is not sponsored by or in any way affiliated with Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc. The Toyota, Lexus and Scion names and logos are trademarks owned by Toyota Motor Sales, USA, Inc.
Linear Mode
